5.4.18

Russian ex-spy’s poisoned daughter says growing stronger

The Russian woman who was poisoned in Britain last month with her
former spy father said Thursday she was recovering, in her first public
statement in a case that has sparked a major diplomatic crisis between
Moscow and the West.
“I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is
growing daily,” Yulia Skripal was quoted as saying in comments released
by the police.
The UN Security Council was due later Thursday to discuss the
spiralling diplomatic crisis sparked by the poisoning of Yulia and
Sergei Skripal.

Yulia Skripal said she had found the incident “disorientating”,
without providing any further details on the attack in her short
statement.
She and her father, a former double agent, were found in a critical
condition on a public bench in the English city of Salisbury on March 4.
Britain blames Russia for incident, but Moscow has furiously denied the charges.
The crisis has led to a wave of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats between Moscow and the West.
Russia on Thursday demanded an “objective” probe into the case ahead of UN Security Council talks.
Russian state television earlier aired an unverified recording of a
phone conversation between Yulia Skripal and her cousin who lives in
Moscow.
In the call, a woman introducing herself as Yulia Skripal said she
was expecting to be discharged from hospital soon and that her father
Sergei was “fine”.
The hospital where the pair are being treated said in their latest
update last week that Sergei remained in a critical condition. ‘Legitimate questions’
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Thursday complained that Britain
had failed to provide “coherent answers” to Moscow’s questions over the
nerve agent attack.
“It will not be possible to ignore the legitimate questions we are asking,” he warned hours before the UN meeting.
The Security Council “should look at this problem in every aspect and, I hope, objectively,” Lavrov said.
Early Thursday morning some 60 US diplomats who were ordered out of Russia left their embassy compound in Moscow.
Russia called a meeting of the global chemical watchdog on Wednesday
over the Salisbury incident, but failed in its bid to join the probe by
the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Russia then requested the Security Council meeting on Thursday at 1900 GMT in New York.
Speaking in Moscow, Lavrov called for a “substantial and responsible”
probe, while alleging the Skripal case was used by Britain as “a
pretext, either made up or staged, for the groundless expulsions of
Russian diplomats”.
President Vladimir Putin said on a visit to Ankara on Wednesday that
“common sense” must prevail to avoid “this damage in international
relations”.
Moscow was unable to get the required two-thirds of votes from
members to approve a joint investigation at Wednesday’s OPCW meeting.
Russia’s UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzia said the meeting in New York
would focus on a letter sent by British Prime Minister Theresa May which
accused Moscow of carrying out the attempted assassination. Facing off in The Hague
Wednesday’s bid to secure a joint probe saw a day of bitter rhetoric between Moscow and Britain and its western allies.
London slammed the joint probe idea as “perverse”.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson hailed the defeat of Russia’s bid.
“The purpose of Russia’s ludicrous proposal at The Hague was clear –-
to undermine the independent, impartial work of the international
chemical weapons watchdog,” he said, adding that Moscow’s main goal was
“to obscure the truth and confuse the public.”
Britain is carrying out its own probe, with independent technical assistance from OPCW experts.
Sergei Naryshkin, head of Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence, warned
Wednesday that both sides must avoid tensions escalating to the
dangerous levels of the Cold War.
He called the affair a “grotesque provocation … crudely concocted by the British and American security services.” Kremlin demands apology
OPCW experts have already taken on-site samples which are being analysed
in The Hague, as well as in four other certified laboratories. The
watchdog said it expected the results by early next week.
But in a move hailed as a vindication by Moscow, the British defence
laboratory analysing the nerve agent revealed Tuesday that it could not
say whether the substance came from Russia.
The Kremlin immediately demanded an apology from May and her
government for implicating Putin in the nerve agent attack, saying this
“idiocy has gone too far.”
On Thursday, The Times newspaper cited British security sources
saying they believe they have pinpointed the location of a Russian
laboratory where the nerve agent used in Salisbury was manufactured.